


black water down

by stardreamertwo



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Body Horror, Dark Caduceus Clay, Dark Fjord, Evil AU, M/M, critmas treat, it's not really angst it's just dark metaphor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-31
Updated: 2020-12-31
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:47:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 737
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28451871
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stardreamertwo/pseuds/stardreamertwo
Summary: They tell stories, about the dark forest and the dark sea. At least, while they still can.
Relationships: Caduceus Clay/Fjord
Comments: 8
Kudos: 22
Collections: Critmas Exchange 2020





	black water down

**Author's Note:**

  * For [MithrilWren](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MithrilWren/gifts).



The roots of the blighted wood drink salt. 

No one's ever tried to test it. Those who go into the forest don't come back. But how else can they explain why the wood thrives, when almost everything else dies in the soil? How else can they explain the way the treeline creeps closer, the tide rises higher, squeezing what land is left between them like a vice? 

The branches' eerie tendrils reach for them, and the ocean's gaping maw bites at their heels, and they are trapped. All they have is a single desperate spot of safety, and it is only getting smaller. 

* * *

“Fjord.”

“Caduceus.”

He is still dripping with seawater when he walks up onto the land. Fjord’s still not sure how Caduceus always knows when he's coming, but he imagines it's something like the way he knows, even now, about the body below the cliffside rocks. What little memory the water brings him, as the fish begin to nibble at its limbs, whispers of a forest, days of hunger, a stumble in the dark.

“I wanted to thank you for the gift,” Fjord says. “It’ll make good food.”

The sea will swallow anything, but Caduceus looks pleased nonetheless.

“You’re welcome.” He lifts his teapot. “Tea?”

Fjord’s not fully human, not anymore, but he knows better than to drink poison. Everything that grows in this forest tastes only of death, and rot. He shakes his head.

Caduceus shrugs, and pours himself a cup.

“I missed you,” Fjord says.

“I’m never far. And neither are you, you know.” In the distance, waves crash into the shore, wailing.

“I know. But it’s good to see you like this.”

“Always,” Caduceus replies, and when Fjord reaches for his hand he takes it.

Caduceus has never flinched from him. Most things would, when faced with all the power of the sea. Most things do. Maybe it is because Caduceus, from the moment Fjord met him, had already known what it was to consume and be consumed- he is too familiar with the feeling to see it as a threat.

Whatever it is, it has made Caduceus unafraid. Fjord’s claws are sharp, and he knows when he touches people they feel the cold, the sea, the water in their lungs. He drowns them. But Caduceus looks at him, placid and calm as ever, and in his eyes Fjord sees a thousand roots. There is too much of Caduceus to drown.

Meanwhile, Caduceus’s hand is blighted in Fjord’s, toxic and seeking. There is poison in his skin, dirt beneath his nails, soil and death and rot. Fjord feels it, reaching for him like roots to water, and welcomes the touch.

“Your hair’s grown.” Fjord reaches up with his other hand and tucks it behind Caduceus’s ear. It’s slightly wavy, curling at the ends, and Fjord thinks of tentacles. Or maybe vines. They’re not so different, in the end.

Caduceus smiles at him. “Forests do that.”

They do. And Fjord has noticed the trees, getting closer to the shore. Nothing’s supposed to be able to grow off salt, but Caduceus has found a way to anyway- to make rot take root in ocean soil. His veins turn purple-black at his wrists, and Fjord runs a thumb over them, feels the sea in his heartbeat.

“I’ll see you soon, then,” he says, and Caduceus nods.

“Soon enough.”

Time has little meaning to them, here, now. They are beyond it, part of something greater, part of something powerful enough to eat the world. When Caduceus is ready, he will meet Fjord, and whatever they’ve consumed in their wake will be nothing more than forest and sea.

Still. Fjord has to leave too soon.

It is part of the ocean, part of what Fjord is. He can never stay in one place too long- pulled, always, by the moon, and the tide, and the water. It calls him, and he goes.

But he squeezes Caduceus’s hand, before he does.

“The sea is always hungry,” he says.

“And the forest wants to grow,” Caduceus responds.

It is a promise, of sorts. They are never truly separated. They are too much a part of each other, now, intertwined in an ecosystem. But it is a promise- that eventually, they will meet, and the sea will consume, and the forest will grow.

They are the earth and the water, the land and the ocean, and the world is theirs.

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote most of this in an hour at 3 a.m. and I am barely conscious right now. The title is taken from the Odyssey's passages on Scylla and Charybdis- thank you to [the_littlest_goblin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_littlest_goblin) for showing me her copy. I can't rightly say this fic maintains the integrity of their canon characterizations, but it was so much fun to write. Thank you, MithrilWren, for giving me the excuse!
> 
> Thank you for reading, and I hope you enjoyed!


End file.
